Tropical Trail was winding and narrow. The palm scrub grew out over the road in spots, and the inlets to neighborhoods buried among the palms and citrus trees came out of nowhere, marked only by little sections of wrought iron gate or cinder block entrance walls. My father’s house wasn’t sunk back into a neighborhood but sat right off the trail by itself, surrounded by its own low concrete wall painted light blue and cut through with starbursts. It was only from my memory of this wall that I recognized the house. There was a white plastic box for the Today newspaper at the end of the driveway, and a black mailbox bearing no name at all, as if he’d done his best to sink himself into a little compound of anonymity. My mother had told me he was selling real estate now and was doing well for himself. Behind the wall, the house, like nearly every building in town, was one story, but given what I knew of Merritt Island, it looked like the home of a rich person. The lawn had a built-in sprinkler system. There were two Buicks in the driveway. I stopped my bike just across his property line.

A woman was carrying groceries in from one of the cars. She was small and had permed hair and her name, if I remembered it right from listening to the arguments just before my father left, was Leona. The trunk to the Buick nearest me was open and she had a bag in each arm. She spotted me as she was rounding the car. I stood perfectly still over my bike at the foot of the driveway. She looked toward the trunk, where another couple of bags sat, and then at me again, as if worried I was going to steal her groceries or maybe wanting me to help carry them. I didn’t move. She walked up the drive, through the garage, and into the house.

Cars whisked by on the road behind me. A dragonfly, like a miniature Huey chopper, zigzagged across the lawn and hovered in front of my face for a moment, then darted away. The door inside the garage opened again, and my father walked out with one hand holding a cigarette. He was smiling slightly. He emerged into the sunlight and, with his head tilted forward, walked between the Buicks to the foot of the driveway.

“Joe,” he said. His dark hair was combed back and straighter than I remembered. “Hi.”

“Your head is bleeding.”

I touched my forehead with my right hand and felt the sticky beginnings of a scab. “I ran into a branch,” I said.

“You want a Band-Aid?”

“It’s okay.”

“You want to come inside? Wash it off?”

“No, thanks.”

His smile leveled out. He drew on his cigarette and looked at my face, then glanced up the trail and exhaled. “You, um … we haven’t talked in a while. How’s school?”